Category Archives: Far right racists

Anti-Islamic group patrols clubs to ‘protect’ Polish women

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Polish Defence League anti-Islam bannerThe far-right Polish Defence League (PLO) has launched “patriotic patrols” in Poland’s bars and nightclubs in a bid, it says, to protect Polish women from being chatted up by Muslims.

The Polish Defence League, which describes itself as “showing the true face of Islam and acting against the Islamisation of Europe,” started the operation in December in cities including Warsaw, Poznan and Krakow. “We are there to observe how Muslims behave and to intervene,” the league stated on its official web site.

“In the space of one evening, in hundreds of places across the country, incidents occur involving the seduction of our female compatriots,” the league claims. “This is a fight for the future of our country and our women,” the PLO claims. “Because one of these girls, unwittingly charmed by an exotic prince could, along with her offspring, end up very badly in the Islamic world, which is advancing on us with great strides.”

According to the PLO, which currently has 3600 fans on its Facebook page, Polish women are warned during the patrols about the “threats” of getting involved with Muslim men, the Gazeta Wyborcza daily reports.

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Man wanted for racist attack after Farnworth EDL march

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Farnworth EDL assault suspectA racist attacker who punched a man in the face after an EDL march in Farnworth is being searched for by police.

The 19-year-old victim was sat in his car outside a fast food shop in Bradshawgate when he was racially abused. He got out of his car and was punched in the face, leaving him with a cut near his eye. Witnesses intervened and the attackers ran off.

Police are appealing for the public to help them identify a man believed to have been involved.

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West Bank mosque partly torched in suspected settler attack

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A Palestinian man stands near a door and wall of a mosque which were vandalised in the West Bank village of Deir IstiyaA mosque in the Israeli-occupied West Bank was partly set on fire on Wednesday in what Palestinian residents said was an attack by Jewish settlers living nearby.

The main gate of the mosque in Deir Istiya village and some of the carpeting inside were charred by the flames. Graffiti in Hebrew, reading “Revenge for spilled blood” and “Arabs Out”, was scrawled on an outside wall and a door.

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Tory MP slams BNP leafleting in Enfield North

Posted on by Bob Pitt

BNP Enfield leafletAn MP has slammed the “scaremongering” tactics of a far-right political party who have been canvassing the borough’s residents.

After he was shown a British National Party leaflet that was posted through the letterbox of one of his Enfield North constituents earlier this month Nick de Bois reacted angrily accusing the right-wing party of “attempting to create tension for political gain”.

The Advertiser has been shown one of the leaflets distributed to households in the borough. It asks residents: “Alarmed by the threat of Islam to your British Identity?” And goes on to refer to scenarios where pubs are converted into mosques which, they claim, would “threaten British identity”.

However the Conservative MP was furious that the leaflets had been distributed anywhere in the borough. Speaking to the Advertiser he said: “This type of ‘copy and paste’ literature – which doesn’t even try to focus on problems in Enfield – is just scaremongering. This type of leaflet is designed to stir up racial tension for the purposes of political gain. It is reprehensible and people in Enfield will see straight through it.”

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Quilliam arranges speaking tour for former EDL leader – in schools

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Duchess's High School AlnwickThe violent ex-leader of the far right English Defence League is set to give talks on tolerance to schoolchildren. Tommy Robinson – a convicted thug, fraudster and football hooligan – is due to begin his tour within days. But the decision to let him into the classroom has sparked fury with the public.

One parent at a school on Robinson’s visit list said: “Given this man’s appalling record for thuggery and his history of inciting racial tension, it beggars belief that he is being ushered into classrooms. I am disgusted. What on Earth has he got to say that’s worth our children hearing? He should just crawl under a rock and keep quiet.”

Robinson, 30, quit the EDL in October, saying he was unable to control some extreme members. He said he had suffered death threats ever since.

He has now joined Islamic think-tank the Quilliam Foundation, which says it aims to tackle extremism. A spokesman said the talks would also be attended by other former members of the EDL. The spokesman added the visits were a continuation of Robinson’s “journey away” from the EDL.

One of the first places he will visit is the Duchess Community High School in Alnwick, Northumberland. Louis Spence, head of RE, defended allowing the dad of three to talk to sixth form and GCSE pupils.

He said: “By inviting visitors as diverse as Tommy Robinson, students are given the opportunity to rise to the challenges they will face as adults. There is a moral courage in thinking through difficult issues, standing up for what you believe in, whilst still showing respect and humanity.”

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Terrorism heightens Islamophobia in Russia

Posted on by Bob Pitt

"Русский марш - 2013" в Москве
Nationalist demonstration in Moscow in November 2013

A spate of terrorist attacks in southern Russia related to jihadist and anti-Russian insurgencies in the North Caucasus have not only led to heightened security measures, they have also contributed to a rising Islamophobic sentiment amongst many ethnic Russians.

This trend has been epitomized by the release on YouTube of a video purporting to show Russian football fans burning a Koran and forcing an apparently-beaten man of Central Asian appearance to repeat “I renounce Allah.” According to the video, the Russians were fans of Moscow’s CSKA soccer club, whose followers have previously been linked with ultra-nationalist chants and violence.

While the police are investigating the case – which could lead to charges of extremism or spreading religious hatred, punishable by up to 5 years in prison – this is symptomatic of a general problem. These inter-communal tensions have already exploded into large-scale conflicts, in Kondopoga in 2006, Moscow’s Manezh Square in 2010 and the capital’s Biryulevo neighborhood in 2013.

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Times discovers non-existent ‘rise in Muslim birthrate’

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Times Muslim birthrate headlineToday The Times has a report by its investigations editor Dominic Kennedy titled “Rise in Muslim birthrate as families ‘feel British’”. The article has been copied and pasted by the Telegraph (“Almost a tenth of babies and toddlers in England and Wales are Muslim, census figures show”) and by the Mail (“One in ten babies in England is a Muslim: Those practising the religion ‘could soon outnumber actively worshipping Christians'”).

Based on an analysis of the 2011 census figures, the report reveals that over 9% of children aged 0-4 are Muslim, whereas Muslims of all ages make up less than 5% of the population. Yes, it’s yet another of those Islamification of Britain articles.

One of the experts whose response to this news Kennedy quotes is David Coleman. He describes the figures as “startling”, although it is difficult to believe that a man who holds the position of Professor of Demography at the University of Oxford was genuinely surprised by the statistics. Kennedy doesn’t bother to tell his readers that Coleman is also co-founder of the right-wing campaign group Migration Watch and has a record of feeding the anti-immigrant hysteria of the right-wing press.

Even Coleman, however, is unable to deny the fact that birthrate among the UK’s Muslim community is falling – the precise opposite of the false claim made in the headline to Kennedy’s report.

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Redbridge Muslim school targeted by far right

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Britain First 'no more mosques'Under the headline “‘Pandemonium’ takes over meeting about Muslim Apex Primary School expansion”. the Ilford Recorder reports that Mohammed Asif, chairman of the Federation of Redbridge Muslim Organisations, is concerned about the way Apex Primary School is being treated, following a council planning meeting which refused to allow discussion of a retrospective application for an additional 64 places at the school.

Mohammed Asif also referred to what the report describes “as a load of Islamophobic comments on a website”. Which one is not specified, but it seems a fair bet that the reference is to the website of Britain First, a far-right group that originated in a split from the British National Party and is led by former BNP councillor Paul Golding. Although only a small group, Britain First has ambitions to contest the European parliamentary elections in May, and has been attempting to win a wider base of support by targeting the Muslim community.

Britain First’s report on Apex Primary School’s planning application provoked comments from its supporters such as: “If you want a muslim school, go to a country that has already been ruined by muslims, don’t bring their prehistoric ways to Britain”, “Get retro permission to kick all out and they can be taught the hatred in a diff country”, “Pack the whole lot off back to Pakistan. YOU KNOW THEY MEAN TO TAKE OVER DON’T YOU”, and so on.

Racist bullying: Far-right agenda on immigration ‘being taken into classrooms’

Posted on by Bob Pitt

ChildLine logoThe number of children seeking help for racist bullying increased sharply last year, as campaigners warn that the heated public debate about immigration is souring race relations in the classroom.

More than 1,400 children and young people contacted ChildLine for counselling about racist bullying in 2013, up 69 per cent on the previous 12 months. Islamophobia is a particular issue in schools, according to the charity, with young Muslims reporting that they are being called “terrorists” and “bombers” by classmates.

Children who have poor English or a strong accent are often called “freshies” – an abusive term that highlights their struggle to fit in.

The rise in children needing help for xenophobic bullying coincides with rising political hostility to immigration – especially in the lead-up to this month’s lifting of restrictions on Romanians and Bulgarians entering the UK. In 2011, just 802 children approached the charity seeking help for racist bullying.

Sue Minto, head of ChildLine, said: “There’s so much more of a focus in the news at the moment about immigrants… it’s a real discussion topic and children aren’t immune to the conversations that happen around them. Some children are being told, even if they’re UK born, to pack your bags and go back where you belong. It is very worrying, it’s a big increase. This past year, it really seems to be something children and young people are suffering with.”

Overall, the number of children needing support for bullying of any kind was up 8 per cent between 2012 and 2013, according to ChildLine.

The charity’s report found that the majority of the racist bullying affecting children was happening at school and many of those calling ChildLine for counselling say teachers ignore the situation or make it worse with clumsy interventions.

James Kingett, of the charity Show Racism The Red Card (SRTRC) which seeks to combat racism, said: “We work with around 50,000 young people every year and issues around Islamophobia have been very prevalent over the past 12 to 18 months. That idea that all Muslims are terrorists or bombers is a particular problem. We’re getting that from kids with no Muslim classmates through to those in diverse schools with many Muslims.”

Mr Kingett added: “We are doing work on the impact of far-right groups such as the English Defence League on children’s attitudes. Often children are picking up language at home and from parents and taking that to be fact. The rhetoric at the moment around immigration is incredibly pervasive. The prominence of the immigration debate may have had a knock-on effect, filtering down in classrooms.”

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Man charged with race attack at proposed Muslim centre

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A man has been charged with racially-aggravated criminal damage on a former pub earmarked to become a Muslim education centre in County Durham. Graham French, 28, from Shotton Colliery, will face the allegation before magistrates on Wednesday, January 22. Police refused to give any further details.

Permission has been given to Kaiser Choudry, who runs the Albert Guest House in the village, to turn the derelict Melrose Arms into an education centre. The decision has sparked demonstrations, the latest held at the start of last month.

Sunderland Echo, 8 January 2014

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